Chevrolet Volt Extends Its Appeal
consumerreports.org
consumerreports.org
http://ev-cpo.com/ is a nice aggregator for the public listings.
If you're looking at sedans/coupes: BMW M235i or 328d xDrive ($50k), BMW 5-series ($60k) Mercedes E250 diesel ($63k), Audi A6 ($56k), Porsche Boxster ($59k).
I wouldn't be sad about my money going to fund cool battery technology and saving the environment. But you could also use it to buy more car.
The price premium for Tesla over a similar gas or diesel luxury vehicle is conservatively $20k (since the BMW M and 5-series are closer to the P85D than the base Model S). Figure diesel is at $2.50. The 328d and E250 both get close to 40mpg highway. You'd have to drive more than 300,000 miles to break even on the electric, and that's before you consider the price of electricity.
I just wish Chevrolet would move a little faster with its release cycle; five years is a long time to take for what amounts to an incremental improvement.
Unfortunately for them, the new Volt arrives just as fuel prices hit a low of $2/gallon, which when adjusted for inflation is the same as in 1971 (about $0.50). Of course, fuel prices will rise again at some point, but the American car market has a short term mentality; when fuel prices are low, large vehicle sales rise, and vice versa.
The Volt will probably continue to do well in the niche market of local urban commuting. The average Volt owners are going 900 miles between fill ups, and the larger battery will probably raise this number.
Adding more weight and room for only a small percent of rides is probably less efficient (economically and ecologically) than just popping into gas for 5% of trips.
Every extra 10 miles you add to the range will make the vehicle that much more useful for a wider category of drivers (in terms of staying in electric mode and avoiding burning gasoline). At some point perhaps they see it as diminishing returns, except that really when it comes to electric vehicles, the more range the better.
My Leaf gets a claimed 80-90 mile range on its 24 KWh battery, so proportionally the 53 miles on 18.4 would make sense, but remember the Volt is carrying around an ICE and all its trappings (it foregoes the drivetrain for the ICE, but it still needs lubrication, cooling, intake, exhaust, etc.) so the volt weighs about 300 lbs more than the Leaf (which is ~10%), and that's going to have an efficiency cost.
Also, I should point out the leaf has had a 25% battery capacity increase in the new model, which should result in a direct 25% range increase since the new battery takes up the exact same space and weight as the old one.
How did they pull that off? Is it a different battery chemistry?
Koenigsegg has the total opposite approach in their hybrid Regera supercar: no gearboxes at all. Low speed high torque is delegated to the electric motors, and the internal combustion engine only engages after a certain speed.
http://jalopnik.com/how-the-1-500-hp-koenigsegg-regera-hits-...
I think that is a potentially fruitful approach.
Is this idea just totally dead for some kind of innate technical challenge? It seems that mechanically, the cost of a generator and one drive train would be preferable, if it were feasible performance-wise.
It would also almost certainly be diesel.
For long distance highway driving, this is less efficient since you have losses between the generator and the electric motors. It can work well for mostly stop-and-go driving and is used in hybrid buses I believe.
EDITED to add: dwhall posted a link with much more detail [1] -- very interesting!
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevrolet_Volt#Drivetrain
[1] http://gm-volt.com/2015/02/20/gen-2-volt-transmission-operat...
My current car is a 2015 Honda Accord Hybrid..it's described as a CVT, but actually isn't. It's an electric car with a clutch that engages an oversized generator/engine when it needs more kick. In stop and go city driving, this arrangement is actually more efficient than highway driving and I've gotten north of 50mpg pretty regularly. Range on 15 gallons of gas is ~650 miles...the car is bigger than a Prius, looks more like a normal car and drives fantastically (since Honda trickled down Acura tech into the suspension system to account for the increased weight and the electric and gas motors combined make the car pretty fast for a family sedan). The only sad thing is that Honda is skipping 2016 for this car and won't produce it until a complete redesign probably in 2017. All told, $25k for the car off the lot and I was able to get a few grand for my old car meaning I paid only slightly over $20k for this tech.
From talking to Volt owners, they have a slightly superior experience in terms of the car having more of a bias towards being electric. But the car is expensive, small and performance isn't great. So I'm not sure who this is marketed towards. A bit more and you're dipping into low-end Teslas.
I find the electric drivetrain much more satisfying even with lower 0-60 numbers, as you have all the torque all the time. I do wish GM also worked on the 0-60 numbers.
> The combined system is capable of producing total system power of 250 kW (335 hp) and 586 Nm (432 lb-ft) of torque. [1]
Disclosure: I am a GM employee.
1. http://media.cadillac.com/media/cn/en/cadillac/vehicles/ct6_...
Those vehicles are so dissimilar it's kinda funny how close they score on the consumer (0-60, top speed) straight line performance metrics. Numbers obviously don't tell the full story but it's amusing since 0-60 and top speed are the two numbers that people that don't know cars generally care a lot about.
I've driven the 2014 ELR (for a week) and test drove a Tesla. The Tesla of course had much better acceleration[1], but even the ELR was satisfying to drive.
With an electric drivetrain you don't have to downshift (or wait for a downshift in an automatic transmission). You don't have to wait for a turbo spool. You don't have to wait for any lags at all. Its really amazing, and I think it must be the future of automotive.
1. In my opinion the 2014 ELR was a beautifully styled high-luxury vehicle with mystifyingly poor performance. I don't know what they were even thinking. The 2016 was a bit better, but still suffered from (I assume) beancountering.
I'll agree that as it stands now electric stuff has to be the future from a purely numbers perspective (emissions will be a bigger issue, demand for oil will rise, methods of getting it will become more expensive, etc, etc) but at this point it's not worth paying the premium for unless you've just got to be an early adopter, live in an area with massive subsidies or want to one up your Prius driving neighbors conspicuous environmentalism.
Automakers have to put smaller and more efficient internal combustion engines to meet fuel economy and emission standards. You can put very powerful electric motors in cars without increasing CO2 emissions significantly.
I do worry that low fuel prices are doing strange and bad things to the market. I think if there were a republican president in power now, (s)he could raise taxes on fuel to help normalize the market, but there's no way Obama could do that at this point in time.
That being said, they sure do have a nice interior for that style of car!
Disclosure: extremely satisfied 2013 Volt owner here.
I test drove every form of electric-augmented automobile available for sale in the midwest (some plug-ins are for sale only on the coasts, so don't have trained repairmen near me).
The C-Max had a useful form factor. It would fit my family with legroom in the rear, although the energi's trunk space was severely compromised by the extra battery. Loading groceries would block the lower 30% view. The C-Max's engine was noisy, annoyingly so. Also, Ford was caught misrepresenting their MPGs and had to readjust them.
I drove a C-Max and a C-Max energi (the plug-in). Between the two, I'd prefer the energi because it runs 100% electric some of the time (but nowhere near what the Volt can do), but the price difference was not justified.
www.gm-volt.com is a great resource for prospective and actual owners. From there I learned that buying a used Volt was a good idea and a great deal for these reasons: 1) used Volt prices are outrageously low for a high-quality car, albeit compact. 2) Reading the dash computer's "lifetime mpg" will let you know (with some reverse math) how many of the miles on the odometer come from the combustion engine vs electric. This is important because a Volt with 30K miles may only have 10-12K miles on gas; the rest electric. And since the electric drivetrain has a 8yr/100,000mi warranty, you're covered. 3) There are guys reporting their Volt's battery still taking 90% of their original charge after reaching 100,000 miles. 4) The guys taking ownership of the 2016 Volt are reporting 50-60 miles all-electric range and quite a bit more punch when putting the pedal down.
edit: Added TL;DR
One of the big selling points for me was its slightly larger trunk than comparably priced hybrids from Toyota or Honda. I go on long road trips at least once a year and have moved across country several times, so internal capacity was a differentiator.
It drives well. It has a stable ride and is easy to drive both in the city and on the highway. I wouldn't describe it as "punchy" or sprightly, but it will move when you need it to and is fairly effortless the rest of the time.
It was initially advertised as having comparable MPG figures to the Prius, but Ford has subsequently modified them to more conservative figures (and as an existing owner compensated me for the reduction). Over the lifetime of the car (~11,000 miles) I have averaged 40MPG in combined city and highway driving.
Overall I am really happy with the purchase and plan to keep it until at least the battery goes (~10 years).